Zechariah 7

1 The Lord sent a message to Zechariah on the fourth day of the ninth month, the month of Chislev. This was during the fourth year of king Darius' reign.

And it came to pass in the fourth year of king Darius, that the word of the LORD came to Zechariah in the fourth day of the ninth month, even in Chisleu;

2 Bethel-sharezer sent Regem-melech and his men to ask for the Lord's blessing.

When they had sent to the house of God Sherezer and Regemmelech, and their men, to pray before the LORD,

3 They were to ask the priests of the Temple of the Lord Almighty and the prophets, “Should I go on mourning and fasting in the fifth month, as I have done for so many years?”

And to speak to the priests who were in the house of the LORD of hosts, and to the prophets, saying, Should I weep in the fifth month, separating myself, as I have done these so many years?

4 The Lord Almighty sent a message to me saying,

Then came the word of the LORD of hosts to me, saying,

5 Tell everyone in the land and the priests, when you fasted and mourned in the fifth month and the seventh month during these seventy years, was it really me you were fasting for?

Speak to all the people of the land, and to the priests, saying, When ye fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh month, even those seventy years, did ye at all fast to me, even to me?

6 And when you eat and drink, don't you eat and drink for yourselves?

And when ye ate, and when ye drank, did ye not eat for yourselves, and drink for yourselves?

7 Isn't this what the Lord told you to do through the former prophets, when Jerusalem was prosperous and inhabited, and when people were living in the Negev and the Shephelah?

Should ye not hear the words which the LORD hath cried by the former prophets, when Jerusalem was inhabited and in prosperity, and its cities around it, when men inhabited the south and the plain?

8 The Lord Almighty sent another message to me.

And the word of the LORD came to Zechariah, saying,

9 This is what the Lord says. Judge fairly and truthfully. Show mercy and kindness to one another.

Thus speaketh the LORD of hosts, saying, Execute true judgment, and show mercy and compassions every man to his brother:

10 Don't exploit those who are widowed or fatherless, foreigners or the poor. Don't think up ways of mistreating one other.

And oppress not the widow, nor the fatherless, the stranger, nor the poor; and let none of you imagine evil against his brother in your heart.

11 But they refused to listen. They were obstinate, turning their backs and closing their ears.

But they refused to hearken, and withdrew the shoulder, and stopped their ears, that they should not hear.

12 They made their minds unreceptive, as hard as stone. They refused to listen to the law or to what the Lord Almighty told them by his Spirit through the former prophets. That's why the Lord Almighty became very angry with them.

Yea, they made their hearts as an adamant stone, lest they should hear the law, and the words which the LORD of hosts hath sent in his spirit by the former prophets: therefore came a great wrath from the LORD of hosts.

13 So since they didn't listen when I called out to them, I wouldn't listen when they called out to me, says the Lord Almighty.

Therefore it is come to pass, that as he cried, and they would not hear; so they cried, and I would not hear, saith the LORD of hosts:

14 With the winds of a storm I scattered them among the nations where they lived as foreigners. The land they left became so desolate that no one even traveled through it. They turned the Promised Land into a desert.

But I scattered them with a whirlwind among all the nations whom they knew not. Thus the land was desolate after them, that no man passed through nor returned: for they laid the pleasant land desolate.